GI Joe Real American Hero Vol VII
By Larry Hama
“No one ever died for a typewriter” Roadblock page 191
Hello everyone and welcome back to the read series! Where I, your humble reviewer, read works selected by our ever-wise patrons or by myself and try to give you an idea of whether or not they're worth your time. I do this in partnership or in battle with your editor as the situation dictates (All power to the proletariat!{Y'all see what I'm dealing with here}). Now to celebrate all of us escaping the year of our Lord 2020 AD (But remember, the systemic problems are still there so 2021 is gonna be interesting too. {Yeah... It's okay to take a couple weeks off though and celebrate guys}) let's turn to one of the great American comic book series, GI Joe. At this point being the seventh review, there's not much more I can add about Larry Hama, other than he doesn't get enough credit (And they should let him write Scrooge McDuck.). Volume 7 covers issue 61 to issue 70, running from July 1987 to April 1988, let's jump in shall we. Warning, these comics are older than most of you so... Spoilers. (A note, my commentary below is using real-world logic, not comic book logic.)
To sum up the situation briefly, the Joes have suffered some losses against Cobra. Cobra, having its ownership of Cobra Island in the Gulf of Mexico internationally recognized combined with an assault on the Pitt successfully destroying the base (but since none of the Joes were in the Pitt at the time, it's not that great a loss), is riding high on the other hand. However, Cobra Commander is out of touch with his organization, literally because he is operating out of a car garage and the bulk of Cobra is following the orders of Serpentor, whom I'm increasingly seeing as an evil Captain America (I unironically love Steve Rogers because he’s a 1930s American SocDem but you know the commentary I am biting back here.). The Joes are still in operation and the volume opens up with Hawk briefing Stalker, Outback, Quick Kick, and Snow Job on a covert rescue operation, into the People's Democratic Republic of Borovia (which seems to be some fusion of East Germany and Yugoslavia or Albania, as they don't seem to be part of the Warsaw Pact proper). The PDRB has arrested an American reporter on false spy charges (Are they actually false? {It’s never really confirmed one way or another}) and is threatening to execute him, which alarms the Defense department and the decision has been made to break him out (A reporter about to be executed alarming the DoD indicates to me that the charges are legit. Just saying.{Eh, the US government does get involved if regular US citizens get imprisoned} It does, but not usually with extraction teams.). With our four joes working with a local dissident, the break-in into the Borovia secret police's main prison goes great. Unfortunately, the reporter isn't there, having been secretly traded for a captured communist spy just that morning by the State Department (So, the answer is no. Not false.{Disagree, he could just have powerful friends}). A trade so secret, they didn't bother to tell the damn Defense Department which leaves the Joes holding the bag (Well at least they got the US State Department right…). Things go from bad to worse; only one Joe is escaping this and the others are going to have to face the gulags of a repressive Eastern European State (Well, yes…). On top of that, because they were officially discharged for the duration of the mission the Defense Department has been ordered to conduct no rescue mission (Wow, dick move DoD, of course I expect that too.). Something that is causing considerable friction and angst within the Joe team (Being betrayed will do that.). This is the A-plot, if you will, of the volume and we see the captured Joes struggle to stay physically healthy and also avoid falling into despair and degradation. If you're not at least a little moved by Stalker's stubborn resistance and efforts to maintain his dignity and self-respect in a system that is built to strip it from you then I don't know what to tell you.
Before I get to the other plots, there are a couple of things I want to touch on. Some folks are going to declare that it's unrealistic that the State Department wouldn't tell the Defense Department what it was doing. Folks this happens all the damn time! Some of it is by accident, I mean the government is a big place and it's easy for a message to get lost. Some of it is on purpose, the Defense and State Departments often jostle each other's elbows in the wilder parts of the world and neither side likes it. When they're not getting flat out framed or led down the garden path by our intelligence agencies (Which is all the time. The CIA for example is just fucking evil on an institutional level.). It doesn't help that often one side gets blamed for the other's screw-ups on top of that. For example, Blackwater or Academi as they are currently called on their... 5th rebranding I think? You hear of them and you think of mercenaries working for the military right? They were originally hired by the State Department who wanted security independent from the Defense Department (Fun fact, they've also been hired by the Department of Homeland Security[Which is full of fash, just like the mercenaries they hire]) this left the troops often cleaning up the messes left behind often with no warning (Because the UCMJ does not apply to scum like Blackwater, the legal situation gets murky when they commit war crimes. And that’s when the Orangenführer doesn’t pardon them. To say nothing of the wrench they throw in diplomacy.). So trust me guys, this is completely-situation-normal. Also, I hate to say it but so is guys being left behind, at the end of the day the primary concern of a military commander is completing the mission (And broadly supporting the political interests of the state. War is politics by other means. Politics can include the personal and economic interests of those in power, by the way.). So despite all that 'No man left behind' marketing, people can and have been left behind. Now I'll say I've seen heroic levels of action by people on the front lines not to leave anyone behind but there's only so much you can do and Mr. Hama brings that home brutally here (Moral of the story: while your battle-siblings care what happens to you, command and indeed the state… don’t. Unless it is convenient.{I would note that command prefers you alive and whole, but the mission comes first and if you got to go down to complete the mission, well that’s why we gave you the big life insurance policy}). This is one of the things that Mr. Hama does to turn GI Joe from something that could have just been shilling toys to a memorable work of fiction, grounding it in reality and working to use that reality to present a story with sometimes fantastical events. Even if it’s a bit depressing at times. Let's... Let's turn to the B Plot.
Back in the states, Billy has had enough of CC's crap and walks out. Ironically this seems to kill any ambition that Cobra Commander has, because he tells Fred and Raptor he's cutting out to rebuild a normal life and try to win his son's respect at least if he can't get his forgiveness (Fat chance of that.). Fred doesn't take this well and after an emotional confrontation ends up leaving Cobra Commander in a shallow grave in the woods (Nice.). It's then that Fred realizes that only a handful of people ever really knew CC so... CC could be... Anyone behind that mask. This leads to Fred deciding that if there's a Cobra Commander sized hole in Cobra's organizational chart, nothing is stopping him from turning that into a Fred sized hole and filling it (You know, I admit the gumption.). So off he heads off in Cobra Commanders new enhanced battle armor determined to hijack for himself command of the world's biggest terrorist group/secret society (or is it the world's smallest nation-state now? Hmmm). Of course, Serpentor's gonna have something to say about that but we're going to put a pin into that because this is the beginning of a giant storyline that I'll want to tackle all at once.
Meanwhile, Billy finds himself drawn to a dojo run by a blind black man who seems to know a damn lot about Storm Shadow, aka Billy's real dad. He also finds himself with the dojo master's best student, a young lady who goes by the name Jinx. Of course, they're both members of the Arashikage Clan and they decide to take Billy to the Joes to meet up with Storm Shadow. The blind black man was none other than the Blind Master of the clan, who worked to disappear after the clan fell apart. Going so far as to have his tattoo removed. I am going to say that the Arashikage policy of adopting people outside of Japan does make sense, after all, if you're going to run a family business of being spies, assassins, and so on, you can't afford to be all the same ethnic group. On the flip side tattooing, the members of your secret society (especially on the forearm!) doesn't make sense but I suppose we needed something (It’s Comic Book Ninja Logic just roll with it.).
Our two plots collide as the Blind Master decides to help the Joes by organizing a rescue for the imprisoned Joes in Borovia. He does this by going outside of the Joe command structure (Which makes sense, because they’re stuck following orders from the DoD, which as we’ve established doesn’t give a shit about any of them.) and rounding up all the ninja and ninja adjacent characters (which is about 6 at this point since this is before the ninja bit got really out of control) faking a couple of deaths here and there and heading off to Eastern Europe for a jailbreak. What's more interesting to me is the discussions between Storm Shadow and Billy as they discuss what is a good reason for using violence and more importantly what's a good reason to even learn how to use violence (This is indeed a very good discussion to have, generally.). Storm Shadow maintains the only worthwhile reason to learn skill at violence is so that you don't have to be violent. That the best warrior is one who hates war. I can understand where he's coming from here. When you get down to the bottom of it, war is a waste. It's a waste of resources that could be used for homes, medicine, food, or education and more importantly, it's a waste of lives, health, and sanity. The only thing I can say in war's defense is sometimes humanity makes it necessary to defend your life, freedom, or home through violence. At such a point it is necessary to waste these resources and lives to prevent something worse from happening. Like for example the continuation and expansion of the American slave system, or Nazi domination of Europe (the existence of foreign colonizers and imperialists) or etc., etc., etc. The fact that there are dozens of good examples throughout human history only underscores the point. Our ninja friends will of course use fantastic amounts of wasteful violence to free the Joes from the gulags and escape into Western Europe, along the way meeting a cast of colorful characters such as the White Clown; seeking his love Magda who was arrested by the Borovian secret police and his circus crew. Whether or not the White Clown will aid them or not however is an open question as turning them in might get him the leverage he needs to free his love or at least find out her fate.
Now some stories in this volume aren't connected to the main plot, for example, Mr. Hama continues the Terrordome saga including such things as a duel between Cobra and GI Joe in orbit! I'm going to leave those stories as discoveries for the reader though with the note that they're worth the read. We also return to Sierra Gordo to find out that both Cobra and the Joes have been outmaneuvered by an insidious 3rd party straight from my editor's nightmares (Oh no…). But I'll leave that story for Vol VIII since most of the story takes place there. While there's a lot of setup in Vol VII, there is a complete plot here and it's a good one. Volume VII of GI Joe A Real American Hero by Larry Hama starts us out in 2021 with an A.
Next week we look at the other work selected by our ever-wise patrons 1177 BC the year civilization collapsed by Eric H Cline. If you like to celebrate the new year by making a change why not become one of our patrons by joining us at https://www.patreon.com/frigidreads where a dollar a month gets you a vote on our monthly poll for upcoming reviews and you can take part in discussions on possible theme months. Like for example, February is our Philip K Dick month where we look at a story written by Mr. Dick and its many adaptations. Voting for February closes on January 31 with March's poll going up on February 1st. Hope to see you there!
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